Can't believe the endless merchandise we are seeing for The Hobbit. It kind of worries me the WB are seeing this movie as it's big cash cow to clear the studios huge debts. We all remember how the movie was nearly never made because of WB's debt problems. I just worry that this is also one of the reasons why we are getting 3 movies rather than 2. If the running times are short on these 3 movies it will confirm it for me. :(

Martin

It wasn't WB's debt problems that held things up, it was (among other things) MGM's debt. WB and the NZ government actually overcame MGM's lack of funds.

Now back to your question:

Not long ago we were talking about the word vulgar...

We (well many of us) have been looking forward to seeing the merch this thing would generate. However, if the T-shirts and the Hobbit Annual are any indication, the merch just looks cheap and unappealing to me.

The film-makers, and Tolkien before them, put so much care into The Hobbit. It's a shame that, taken in total, the merchandise creates a very different image --it's a shame too that the production was so indiscriminate apparently when it came to sharing its license.

But no matter how vulgar the merchandise, nor how promiscuous or lacking in discernment the license holders may be, as dormouse says, we are under no obligation to buy the stuff.

However, I think it will be difficult to avoid the stuff altogether, as it seeps into our culture. It's a kind of pollution, like smog, or noise... we can try to ignore it but it's still there affecting the world around us.